Your own research site Operation Prefrontal Cortex provides information on meditation and the impact it can have on the brain. Had you been meditating before your shooting and what came afterwards?

Yeah, meditation was actually something I was already doing. But I didnt really know what it was doing for me. It wasnt until later, when I started reading different things that talked about violence and aggression, the brain, abuse, neglect, stress and then as you bring them together. We were the first people to actually bring this information together [with Operation Prefrontal Cortex].

It was actually around the time a rapper a lot of rappers were being killed the rapper Smoke Dawg was killed on Queen Street [in 2018]. That was the one after which I decided to go to the mayor with our information [Operation Prefrontal Cortex]. I sat down and decided to present something to him. And then when TEDxToronto asked me to speak, I really got in there and started to bring it all together.

No, but the thing was so clear. You know, from the middle school in San Francisco to the violent prison in Mexico, you see how these places are changed with the [Advance Peace meditation] program. You know, the environments were so extreme, the before and afters are so extreme. There was no real need to go and find something to double-check it.

I want Advance Peace [a charitable organization based in Richmond, Calif.] to come here. Advance Peace has a serious track record in the States. What they did in California, changing a city that had eight times the national average of gun crime down to a 40 per cent drop in one year, we need that here. What I care about is the violence in our city and it calming the f**k down. We need to look at places that have gotten results and do them. If thats what it takes, then thats what we should do. Because not only have they gotten results, say like in Sacramento, theyve saved that city $29.2 million because of the gun crimes they have been able to prevent.

Beyond even what we are talking about with Advance Peace, we need to be getting into these communities and helping kids that are already in trouble. You have to have a conversation, a very real conversation about whats going on. Why is the world shaping young people who feel murder is the way to settle the dispute? Whats going on? You have to really get serious about this because now theres no peeing section in a swimming pool, and you can only hold that back for so long, right? And now, the violence has spilled out into places where we all are.

It makes a lot of sense for what we got going on. Not every situation needs a cop. And when it comes to gun crime, we need to deal with prevention. Cops show up afterward and catch people. If its someone you love that has just been murdered, yeah, justice is nice, and thats important. But you would have much rather that the shooting never happened. And thats the program we are talking about that gets at prevention and stopping them as opposed to catching them.

The deputy mayor, Ive spoken to him about it. Hes seen the results, and he will present it to the city council on the 29th [of June]. And then well see where it all goes. But this is an approach that makes sense. It should be provincial. This should be how we tackle what we got going on in our city, in our province and across the board. This is a big deal: to begin to look at the young people and see their potential.

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Director X on how the 'Advance Peace' initiative could help end gun violence in Toronto - Post City